A tool has been developed by two researchers out of New York University which generates a bunch of fake searches. Since there are a lot of searches, your search would get diluted and lost between these searches. So, that way your search terms are usually lost in the process and hence giving you privacy.

Associated Press reports that the tool comes as AOL revealed it had released the search histories of more than 650,000 subscribers. Although user names were not included, the company admitted that the search terms themselves could contain sensitive information. Two AOL employees were fired and a third resigned over the disclosure.

This tool sends random searches, such as “boston clock” and “croissant,” to the four largest search engines — Google, Yahoo, Microsoft’s MSN and AOL. A fake search is made every 12 seconds under default configurations; the tool can generate millions of unique queries from its list, and users can add their own.

Trackmenot works only under firefox currently. Firefox does not have the user base when compared to internet explorer. According to some surveys, firefox is used by less than 10% of the total browsing population. Hence this tool might not be a big success. Also, by segregating the terms this tool generates, it is possible to eliminate the searches made by this tool and hence negating the tool.

The Second Browser War

Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 6.0 reigned supreme at the beginning of the 21^st century, its rival Netscape crushed, the Browser Wars of the 1990s over. The “Evil Empire” had won, to the dismay of Microsoft’s rivals. With Netscape gone, and most Macintosh users running IE for the Mac, IE had no serious competition for years.

This changed in 2004. The massive attacks of Blaster and LoveBug brought Microsoft’s security issues into public awareness, and the Mozilla Foundation released version 1.0 of the Firefox browser. Now, two years later, Firefox has seized ten percent of IE’s market share, Safari rules the Macs, and IE 6.0 seems clumsy and antiquated by comparison. With websites like Explorer Destroyer forcefully advocating Firefox, the Browser Wars are raging again.

The Empire Strikes Back

After two years, Microsoft seems to have finally awakened. “Wait a minute!” Microsoft is thinking, “in two years Firefox has shaved off ten percent of our browser market share. We’re the Evil Empire, for gosh sake! We need to strike back!”

Now, with IE 7 Beta 2 (the first attempt at a new version of IE in five years), Microsoft is planning to strike back. But will IE 7 shape up to be an effective browser, or will it continue IE 6’s failures?

Let’s take a look at the Beta 2 version and see if we can find out:

Interface Evolution

The interface is a good deal less chunky than IE 6’s. The various toolbars and whatnot take up a smaller percentage of the total screen space. (You can, of course, still hit F11 to switch the browser to full screen mode.) You’ll note that the menu bar has disappeared. By default, it’s hidden, though you can bring it back through the toolbars’ contextual menu.

For some reason, the navigation buttons (back, forward, refresh, etc.) are scattered across the top of the screen. IE 6 keeps the navigation buttons on the left side of the toolbar, and so do Firefox, Opera, Safari, and most other web browsers. For casual, rapid browsing, hopping the mouse back and forth across the top of the screen rapidly gets tiresome.

Tabbed browsing has been around, in various forms, for over ten years, and IE has finally gotten around to including the technology. The tabbed browsing interface in IE 7 is slick enough. You can open a new tab through a keystroke, through the menu bar (if it’s enabled), or by clicking the button to the right of every open tab.

Tabbed Tiles

Quick Tabs is a rather useful new feature. It’s similar to Exposé in the Mac OS X shell. Hit CTRL+Q, or click on the Quick Tabs button, and your opened tabs are shown in miniature tiles across the screen. If you have numerous tabs open at once and can’t remember what’s what (I tend toward 10-15 open tabs), it’s a useful way to refresh your memory and hop from tab to tab. I wholeheartedly approve, and hope Firefox and Safari implement something similar.

Favorites Center

The Favorites menu has been replaced in favor (pardon the pun) of the Favorites Center. It acts as a sort of drop-down menu box. In the left column are saved bookmarks. In the center column, IE 7 finally has support for RSS feeds (something Firefox has had from the get-go), and the rightmost displays the browsing history. This unified sort of menu tool is far more elegant than IE 6’s separate Favorites menu and drop-down History (and utter lack of RSS support).

And the Search Wars rage on

In the upper-right hand corner IE 7 has an integrated search box, undercutting legions of add-on toolbars for IE 6. The search box, of course, defaults to Windows Live. This recently caused a minor controversy when Google accused Microsoft of anti-competitive tactics, claiming that the default setting of Windows Live deprived end users of choice. This isn’t entirely true; it’s reasonably simple to change the default search provider through the drop-down menu to the right of the search box, no more difficult than changing the default home page. And if you visit Google with IE 7, Google offers a helpful reminder to make Google the default search provider (though, in truth, the message is about as irritating as the “upgrade to IE 6” error messages from IE-only websites).

Net for the Phishers of Men

So IE 7 certainly has an overhauled interface. But the slickest interface in the world is meaningless if the browser isn’t secure. IE 6, as well all know, has had some very public failures. Does IE 7 resolve this in any way?

Microsoft’s most-touted security improvement in IE 7 is the phishing filter. Phishing has become an epidemic problem, to the point where it threatens the viability of on-line commerce. An effective and widely available phishing filter could do much to alleviate the problem. But does it work?

I get something like 40-50 faux PayPal phishing e-mails a day. I picked one at random, copied and pasted the URL into IE 7’s address line, and waited to see what would happen. Right away a full-screen warning appeared, far more effective than a tame “unrecognized certificate” warning.

The anti-phishing system apparently works by user reports, so it could lend itself to abuse (similar to Google-bombing). On the other hand, IE 7 doesn’t actually stop a user from visiting a website, it merely displays a very large and strident warning. A user can still choose to view the page. Still, it’s been said that Homer Simpson would use IE 6, and since Homer’s almost certainly ignorant of security technologies (https, SSL, secure-password practices, etc.), a simple and unambiguous phishing warning is probably a good thing.

So is it any good?

Given that IE 6 remains the dominant web browser, the final version of IE 7 will likely inherit that position. IE 7 Beta 2’s interface is, beyond question, a vast improvement over IE 6’s. (Though, to be honest, this isn’t saying all that much.) However, most of the improvements are catch-ups to features that have been available in other browsers for years.

And is IE 7 more secure? Certainly Microsoft has gone to considerable lengths to tighten IE’s security. The “sandbox mode” for the Vista version, its decreased integration with the Windows shell, and phishing filter are welcome strides. But will they work? Will it resist spyware and provide protection from drive-by downloads? Or is there some undiscovered security flaw lurking deep within IE 7’s code, some flaw that will enable the next great worm attack?

We’ll just have to wait and see.

In the meantime, the Browser War will go on, and we’ll see if Microsoft can come out on top a second time.

All too often I find site owners are confused (or in denial) about how to achieve the search engine rankings they desire on the SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages). So, I am pleased to offer you my version of “Organic Listings 101.”

Several times each day I get approached by site owners wanting to be in the top 5, 10, top page for organic (free) listings. The organic results are those that display to the left and below “Sponsored Sites” or “Sponsored Results at Google, MSN and Yahoo!. These “Sponsored” advertisement boxes are part of Pay Per Click programs where site owners bid for positioning.

What we’re going to discuss today are the free listings that are gained by how your site is ranked based on a combination of unique variables (algorithm) of each search site. Which, to muddy things up further, evolve without notice.

Let’s first set the stage so that we have realistic expectations here. When I started my consulting practice back in the early 90s, it was relatively easy to get found. The volume of sites and the level of competition were not one iota of what they are today. Fast forward to 2006 and you have close to 12,000,000,000 (yes, that’s billion) pages with a good 10,000,000 being added daily.

So how do you get visibility in the SERPs? Shuffling or adding keywords in your Meta tags won’t do it. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) isn’t the end-all-be-all either. You have to have a well rounded, smart long term marketing plan for your site that includes certain basics for you to rise in the organic rankings.

Issues for consideration to gain improved organic listings:

* Look at your Web marketing plan as a long term effort. New sites are in Google’s sandbox for 6 months or more, and it will take time and effort to be viewed as more relevant than the sites that are already online in the free positions you seek.

* Part of putting your plan together is to do a search with your top keyword phrases on the various search engines so that you are aware of the competition and the volume of sites already successfully ranking for the terms you are targeting. This gives you a real-world understanding of the level of competition you will be up against.

* Understand that how your Web site ranks has nothing to do with how good you are at what you do. It has to do with how good your site is and how good others including the search engines think your site is. That requires a long term realistic marketing plan to grow your site to be the best most comprehensive resource on your product or service for your site visitors. It doesn’t happen overnight or just because you say you want it to.

* Forget about trying to rank for one-word keywords-much too difficult and in some cases downright impossible. Concentrate and target 2-3 word phrases instead of one-word keywords and you’ll get more targeted visitors as well. There are several tools to assist you in investigating what keyword phrases your target market is actually using. Use these tools to your advantage!

* Make sure each page within your site targets and is optimized for only one or two, 2-3 word keyword phrases each. Niche is what works for organic listings! The more you are about; the less you are about any one thing. Search results are based on numerous factors; one being relevancy for the terms the searcher is using. If you are targeting 10, 20, 30 terms per page, that page is not strongly about any given topic vs. another site that has a page or pages concentrating on just one or two phrases each. Keep in mind that less is more when it comes to targeting keyword phrases on a page by page basis.

* To “top” the sites already out there, you have to do just that! Top them! What makes your site better and more valuable to your site visitors? If you don’t have anything unique and of quality or value to offer, you’ll never push those who already hold these positions out of your way.

* Plan on adding new information to your site on an aggressive basis. Daily, weekly, minimally monthly! Resources, white papers, “how tos” not only add value but will naturally work wonders as keyword targeted pages. Offer the type of information those seeking your product or service will find useful and search for and that other sites will want to link to. Don’t even think of cheating and using content generating software…You’ll get nowhere with that approach. You need to have well written content of value; not keyword stuffed ramblings.

* Plan on having lots of patience. Rome wasn’t built in a day and attaining great organic listings no longer happens in a day, a month, or even a year. Any business that hopes to succeed needs to take a consistent and informed long-term approach. This applies to organic listings ten-fold.

Yes, without a doubt all of the above recommendations require your time, effort and a realistic understanding of how organic listings are accomplished. But this is the reality of how great listings, over time, are attained. It is really quite simple-strive to make your site the best it can be; THE site for your product or service and your rankings will improve!

There are no short cuts or trickery for fast top 5, 10, top page organic results. If someone tells you otherwise, they are trying to use what you don’t know to get into your pocket book. Make a commitment to continually build your site to be the best it can be to your site visitors and your organic rankings will happen. Web sites and rankings are a work in progress after all!

Without implementing the above, you are left with only one choice in order to get visibility to those searching for your product or service. You will need to invest in a well planned Pay Per Click program and the corresponding budget necessary to reach your goals.

Everyone wants top 10 rankings as though just because they wished it that should make it so. Wishing has nothing to do with rankings. Unless you have a genie in a bottle, we all know it simply just doesn’t work that way.

How about I get you thinking differently about this issue?

Don’t Chase Search Engines-Let Them Chase You!

How is that possible?

Become a Search Engine All-You-Can-Eat Buffet!!

I can hear you out there… “Yeah, sure!” Well, it’s not that difficult of a methodology really. All you have to do is think differently than all the hype, amateur Web designers and unscrupulous marketing “gurus” have led you to believe about how getting found works.

First off, what search engines like is fresh content and lots of it; yummy! That’s the fuel for their fire so to speak. So it goes without saying that if you keep adding new content on a regular basis that will encourage search engines to visit your site because you’ll have a fresh buffet of tempting entrées.

How do search engines know you have new content? Certainly not by osmosis!

If you make the effort in the appropriate areas, much of which the costs are minimal, they’ll get a whiff of the appetizing content you have to offer and act like they are at an all-you-can-eat buffet!! Your site will be like Mama’s house on a Sunday afternoon. You know what I mean; dinner smells so good everyone in the house can’t wait to get a plateful! That’s how it goes with search engines and content.

If you don’t have savory content-why should search engines visit you and give you higher rankings over those who serve up a delicious all-you-can-eat Sunday dinner? The answer is they don’t.

The “build it and they will come” way of thinking does not apply to Web sites in this day and age, so everyone needs to wash that concept right out of their hair. All it takes is for you to be prepared to mix, cook and serve. Mix up a new article, cook it to perfection and serve it to the hungry search engines!

That’s not too much to ask to succeed online is it? If it is, well, maybe you should reconsider your online endeavors. If you don’t want to make these efforts, just forget about achieving no charge organic/natural listings. You’ll never rank anywhere near the top so determine your PayPerClick budget and go setup your campaign straight away.

Now let’s setup your buffet! Start a blog that you post to continually and submit it to all the blog directories. Make sure your blog offers a subscribe feature so visitors get notified by e-mail when you enter a new post. Also offer RSS and podcasting feeds of your blog posts so that visitors can get your information in as many flavors as they choose. See? Your mouthwatering buffet is growing!

Onliners visit your blog and then follow the links to the scrumptious new articles on your site. They like your articles and link to them or post them on their site with a link to yours. Incoming links to your site; lip smacking good!

You also offer an RSS feed of your top articles to get the word out. You add your new articles to your site map. Google checks for your site map XML file and updates its index with your freshly baked content. You add your seasoned articles to all the article banks that have popped up in the last year or so-more delectable links to your site! Can you see what is happening? We are creating a feeding frenzy!

This interactive medium called the Web is now more interactive than ever. At first when it all began, “interactive” meant some flashing this or moving that. Now interactive means just that; you need to interact and be involved by using all these tools or you’ll be left in the dumpster by those who do.

One thing is sure; chasing search engine algorithms is a futile effort at best. But when you have the nourishment they want, tasty content, search engines are hungry little bots and it’s hard to keep them away. Food for thought? You bet! Open your own buffet today and feed the beast!

The online marketing arena is murky with quick tips and strategies to optimize your site for the best free search engine rankings. Without participating in “sponsor” advertising or PPC (Pay Per Click) programs, it is a fact that search engine optimization can enhance your “natural” or “organic” listings. But within reason and only when done within the rules.

Unfortunately, there are a plethora of unethical search engine marketers that do not hesitate to take your money by making impossible promises based on little to no actual experience in doing so even for their own sites. If you’ve read my previous article The Ten Commandments of Search Engines, you’ll then have a good grasp of what is involved.

When approached either by spam or on the phone with the following pitches, know them to be untrue or misleading at best! Companies that offer you these “solutions” do not really know what they are doing. Well, that is a subjective statement, they either think they know what they are doing, or know for a fact they are bending the rules in an effort to bypass standard practices. One thing is clear, they are banking on your lack of knowledge to get into your pocket book!

1. Change/Update your Meta Keyword Tags: If only it were that easy! I have seen those who have been conned into paying high fees to have some designer update their Meta Keyword tags because this will produce better listings. List whatever you want within that tag and you’ll get found when searched for. Baloney! The fact is the majority of search engines completely ignore or put little to no value on the Meta Keyword tag.

2. Creating Doorway Pages or Mini Sites: Yikes! This is considered spamming the search engines and will get your site dropped and banned completely. Any page that is not a linked to part of your site and is created with duplicate content for the sole purpose of manipulating search engine listings is a disaster waiting to happen. The same site or info on a different domain name to garner duplicate listings is simply spamming the search engines. They all have rules against this and don’t take kindly to folks who use these tactics. Anyone offering you this solution is surely not playing by the rules or worthy of your hard earned dollars.

3. Guaranteeing Positions: Experienced and ethical marketers can and should certainly show you how they approach the process and what results have been achieved in the past. However, if they are true pros running an legitimate shop, they will never promise or guarantee future results - either is position or for length of time. Those who make these promises are mostly likely not playing by the rules and spamming the search engines with a multitude of doorway pages or redirected cloak pages - both of which are big no-nos!

None of us have any idea what search engine algorithms will be tomorrow let alone a week or a month from now. Guaranteed positions can only be promised by participating in Pay Per Click programs and purchasing your positions. In particular for new sites, plan on 7-8 months before you see the fruit of your labor for organic listings on Google.

4. Instant Link Popularity & Results: Anyone who has been online even for a short amount of time has found out that the word instant does not apply to most things online. If the word “instant” is used in particular when it comes to a link program you know the company making the offer is using under the table trickery to temporarily boost your listings. They do this by using expired domains or adding you to link farms on their servers that link all their clients together. The downside is eventually this catches up with your site and has the opposite effect on

Link programs are only successful when done properly. A key factor in any successful link directory creation is that all the sites have something in common in topic or site focus that benefits the site visitors to each site. This takes time and consistency to build (just like anything that produces results online). When it comes to links, a site owner’s search engine ranking desires need to take a back seat to offering site visitors quality resources.

5. Your Site Is Just Fine the Way It Is: I’ve seen this train of thought from both site owners whose ego is invested because they created their own site (or don’t want to pay to have it done right) and from unethical marketers willing to take advantage of that train of thought to make some bucks. Don’t believe that pitch for a moment!

I have yet to run into a site when contacted for advice that I cannot optimize for better organic listings. Heck, I can probably find issues with some of my own sites where I could optimize further if I so desired. If optimization was not considered during the development stage and the copy writing stage of your site - you having catching up to do.

This includes having complimentary navigation that is not only consistent throughout your site for your site visitors, but ensuring your navigation is “crawler friendly” so you have the best chance for your entire site to get listings. This requires planning way in advance of any bit of code or copy being created.

For those who have read other articles of mine, you’ll find the same reoccurring theme. There are no quick fixes or short cuts. Your site is a business and it has to be given the same amount of dedication and planning that any off-line business venture would require. And, online is nothing if it isn’t about marketing! You have to spend your time and invest your budget in the appropriate areas to make things happen - or they won’t and you end up throwing good money after bad all in an effort to save time or money.

This means following the rules and implementing proven strategies that are the core of all successful Web sites. Because there are far too many companies out there that willing take advantage of the hungry uniformed site owners with the desire for “quick, cheap and easy” - you are now armed with the facts. One of the most popular acronyms used online in the early days, applies here: TANSTAAFL: There Ain’t No Such Thing As A Free Lunch!

Avoid working with anyone who portrays the above as your path to better listings. Let them know you know better and then spend your time and money to work on growing a site that is the best it can be about your products or services. Have a plan and do things the right way and the traffic will come.

Each of my clients are advised in detail when their site launches the reality of organic or free Search Engine listings and what will be necessary to ensure their target market finds them when searched for. I also provide a very lengthy detailed explanation of the process and what to expect - as well as what not to expect. Included are issues that need to be addressed and considered moving forward. Unfortunately, many times the spam of easy listings and top 10 positions drowns out the truth of what is required to gain and maintain relevant positions.

Needless to say, these issues have evolved over the past decade as Search Engines struggle to offer more relevant results. This necessitates professionals such as myself to study and become proficient in how the various search sites and services operate so that I may assist clients when called upon in acquiring the listings they desire - if they are willing to approach this effort from a business point of view. From a realistic point of view.

In order to have realistic goals and expectations I think the first thing we need to do is put the massivity of the online world into perspective:

Based on the above, what intelligent person would not take as a given the work that will be required to get found?

This article is continually updated as I do my best to review and update, test and provide, every possible insight and bit or byte of information critical to acquiring relevant organic/free Search Engine listings. This information is not my opinion, my take or just my viewpoint. This information is an accurate representation of the way the Search Engine environment operates and what is required to get found. Like it or not, it is best dealt with than ignored or disregarded - that is unless you have deep pockets to purchase the traffic you desire.

Just like anything else to do with your Web Program your listings have to be worked at - consistently to produce results. They don’t just happen by osmosis or for perpetuity or by changing a few things here or there on your site. So, don’t shoot the messenger as they say!! ;-)

The Ten Commandments of Search Engines:

1. Thou shalt not expect that Search Engines will drive massive amounts of traffic to your site immediately based on the initial registration with free services upon the launch of your site. Listings take time to solidify. Google as an example has what is known as their “sandbox” where new sites land for up to six months or more before hitting Google’s public index! Although many engines state anticipated time frames (many also clearly offering no guarantees when or if) as to when your listing may be added to their database, many times it is much longer due to the massive volume of new submissions submitted daily. And, as you tweak your site for better placement you can expect a certain level of latency in any changes your tweaks may ultimately reflect.

2. Thou shalt not expect that Search Engines will drive massive amounts of traffic to your site immediately after you pay for reviews or inclusion. Ongoing tweaking of your site based on the competitiveness of your particular online market will then be required to get optimum visibility above your competitors. Yes, even after paying for reviews you still have to keep working at this! There are no guarantees. If you are in a industry with little competition, getting relevant listings is much easier than one saturated by 100’s or possibly 1000’s of sites fighting for the same top page listings.

3. Thou shall understand that if you don’t track your listings and keep your site “fresh”, growing with content and current with technology, those competitors that do will be listed before you and your listings will begin to deteriorate. No way around this. Don’t grow, track and react, your site will drop in positioning.

4. Thou shall know that those companies that offer you “top of page” listings for $500+ dollars per month are simply signing you up for “Sponsored”, “Paid” or “Featured Listings” that the Search Engines or PPC services offer. These listings are purchased and have nothing to do with your site, organic/free listings or the “keywords” in your meta tags. You can sign up for these services yourself and save thousands of dollars by visiting the Search Engines and reviewing their programs. Then, here again, be prepared to chomp on all the data that will be provided so that you can tweak and modify your program to garner the best results.

5. Thou shall realize that some of the top scammers on the Net are those who promise unbelievable results with little effort, touting all that is stated in this article to not be necessary. Many using tactics that simply do not work or may temporarily work and when detected could get your site banned. As a matter of fact, Google has added a warning on their site about these “services”: http://www.google.com/webmasters/seo.html

6. Thou shalt not sit back and think that without participating, networking and taking advantage of on and off-line opportunities to get exposure for your “dot com” that you will get traffic anyway. You won’t. Look at those figures I mentioned above again. While site and link popularity are an important part of getting found, they aren’t the end-all-be-all either - just one part of the formula. Quality, relational links to your site can boost your listings - but that won’t happen unless you are out there working at getting other sites to link to you. Why would any site link to you unless you have quality content worth linking to? The answer is, if they are committed to building a quality site for the long haul, they won’t. Valuable content, articles and white papers - now that’s information worth linking to!

7. Thou shall understand that this is not a “build it and they will come” environment. With literally billions of Web pages online and 10 million going live daily, how do you realistically think your potential customers will find you without ongoing reactive and proactive efforts? They won’t. You need to look at your stats, see where you are currently listed and then determine an ongoing plan on how to improve upon your listings if you want to place higher than you currently are. Simply changing your keywords or adding more keywords won’t make any difference if other issues are not seriously considered. In particular for new sites, plan on at least 6 months before you see the fruit of your labor for organic listings on Google. And that’s if you build a site Google considers worthy. You’ll be in the Google “sandbox” for some time.

8. Thou shalt not believe that by simply running around and resubmitting your old stale site, every day, every week, every moment will be all it takes. Believe this at your own peril! Some engines consider resubmitting, if not done within established guidelines, as spamming them and you can be dropped or worse yet banned. Actually, if you are doing everything right, the Search Engines will find you and there really is no need to submit or resubmit your site at all. Software that automatically submits your site for you is ignored and can also identify you as a Search Engine spammer causing your site to be removed and blocked entirely from future submission efforts. No way around doing the hard work!

9. Thou shall understand that only unwavering commitment and ongoing investment, which includes a rabid aggressive, proactive marketing campaign both on and off-line, including Search Engine and PPC (Pay Per Click) monitoring and tracking is necessary to have consistently relevant listings. You also need to plan on adding and growing your site with content rich topical information to compliment these efforts or your efforts will not meet their full potential.

10. Thou knows that even though they may not like the Ten Commandments of Search Engines, that in no way diminishes the reality of fact and truth in how Search Engines work and what you need to do as a site owner to ensure consistent relevant listings over your competitors. IOW, if you don’t work them, they won’t work for you.

Many think listings should just happen. Or that by changing or adding keywords or some phrases here or there that all your target customers will be able to find you. There is nothing further from the truth! Look at your stats! See the traffic you are getting and from where. Run Search Engine tracking reports on your targeted keyword phrases and compare them to your stats and make modifications and adjustments based on that data. Create keyword rich informative articles and add them to your site on a regular basis.

Search Engines tweak how they list sites all the time. This is called their algorithm. And each will list your very same site differently. They have database problems where blocks of sites are dropped - for no reason. What happens if they change how they list sites or have system problems and you are not tracking your listings to notice the negative effect? What if your competitors are more involved and aggressive than you are? That is what is called lost opportunity!

Did you know that all but one of the crawlers for Search Engines and Directories completely IGNORE or give low relevance to those keyword tags you hear so much about? Why do so many business owners think that by virtue of “wanting” to pull by certain keywords, or by shuffling or changing keywords that makes it so? They choose to believe their friends, or the latest junk mail or someone trying to sell them that cheap and easy solution that only benefits the respective salesperson’s pocketbook. (See the Google URL above.)

“Wanting”, “feeling”, “thinking” doesn’t cut it! Doing, planning, reviewing and taking action in an environment that is fluid and constantly changing is what works. What other medium do you have the results of your efforts at your fingertips 24/7? None!

Don’t blame the Web, don’t blame the Search Engines, don’t blame the fact that to reach your goals one has to spend more time and/or money - try or learn new things - all the time. That’s what this gig is all about - learning, changing, doing - rolling with the proverbial punches! Certainly, don’t believe friends and associates who claim unbelievable results without the efforts mentioned here - impossible!

If any site is not receiving the traffic they want, the only person to blame is the site owner. If one is unwilling to rise to the occasion and participate based on facts and reality of what technology demands instead of spending that energy complaining the Web or technology is too difficult, requires too much effort or costs - I am impotent to assist. Whether you like these commandments or not is moot. If you want to succeed online which generally means you have to get found, you have only one choice to make. Either know the rules and play by them or do not plan on even finishing the game.

If up until now you have neglected this area of your Web program, here are some issues to consider:

[See my article: Turning Hits into Clicks]

What’s the bottom line? No serious site owner should rely on free Search Engine listings or Google alone when there are so many other things they can be doing to gain additional exposure. Search Engines should only be considered a part of your online marketing program - not the sole focus.

Don’t blame the Web because it is so challenging - that is the nature of the beast and what some of us find so exciting! If disappointment is yours, it is because you have not used technology to it’s fullest by being involved or making the commitment to ensuring results based on information provided. Both of which can be changed from this moment forward!

Organic or natural search engine listings, the free ones you don’t have to pay for, require some strategy and forethought to acquire. One of most important factors when it comes to free search engine rankings is relevancy. To pull on that coveted top page your site has to be one of the most relevant sites pertaining to the search at hand.

When a search is performed, those sites that are deemed the most relevant, at that point in time for the search being performed, will be listed in order of their level of perceived relevancy. Be about a ton of things - you are on page 100; but using the “less is more” methodology you may just be able to get on that coveted top page.

One of the most common misnomers I get approached with on almost a daily basis is the assumption that one’s site should pull on the top page for any term they desire simply because they will it to. First and foremost you have to be realistic and think about why your site deserves to rank higher than those already listed. “Wanting” has nothing to do with rankings unless it is backed up with a long-term consistent proactive strategy to acquire the desired results.

Don’t fall for the hype or misinformation that is so prevalent on this topic. The noise can be overwhelming and confusing when actually the solution is quite simple. When it comes to your search engine rankings, if you remember anything, remember that less is more. The more you are about or try to cram on one page, the less you are relevant for any one thing and the more difficult it will be for you to hope to get on the top page.

Being searchers are looking for one targeted issue, topic, service, or product - you want to determine what those most searched for terms are for your product or service and make sure your site is optimized for those terms. In addition, by simply concentrating on targeted phrases you will benefit from a more targeted site visitor too!

Using your top page as an example, integrating 30-40 “keywords” covering every possibility of how you want to get found does not make you relevant about any one topic. You are a mishmash of 30-40 things - your efforts are clearly diluted by not being solidly about any one thing! Less is more! The pages or sites that are solidly about one single topic that the searcher is seeking will naturally be listed before yours. No way around this - this is the way search engines, for the most part, work.

To try to pull for one word terms is a futile effort at best; the numbers are against you. And to guess what you “think” folks may use is not your most productive approach either. What if the phrases you “think” searchers are using is not what searchers are actually using to find a site like yours? That is why it behooves you to investigate the available data at sites like Google and Yahoo! Search Marketing to see what your potential customers are in fact using before and during the development of your site, and then moving forward as you grow your site.

Begin by rewriting your top page to include no more than one or two of the top phrases your target market is actually using. About 250 words of readable, customer catering verbiage will do. No more! Remember, the more you add, the more you will dilute your efforts. Then for every additional keyword phrase you would like to eventually have hopes to acquire reasonable rankings for, write an article around that topic and give focus to that individual keyword phrase on its very own page. Turn your wealth of information, knowledge and experience into an article archive or Blog! Now that’s how you get rankings!

Moving forward, as topics arise and time allows write a white paper, resource page or article on each topic/phrase you feel is of importance to your site visitors. This approach automatically translates to you improving the chances of your site getting found. Don’t try and fool the search engines with random babbling and incoherent text - you want to have valuable information. Information that serves three critical purposes!

First, having targeted pages makes your site visitors happy because they have found the helpful, useful information they were seeking and will be more likely to contact you. Secondly, valuable information and articles also better your chances of acquiring those cherished inbound one-way links that contribute to your search engine popularity factor (another factor in achieving healthy rankings). And, thirdly, more content combined with the above will naturally help your rankings to improve.

Remember, we don’t care which page your site visitors enter your site through! If you have a quality design and consistent navigation, every single page of your site should be thought of as a potential doorway to the rest of your site. So go take a look at your site now and integrate the “less is more” methodology and watch your rankings turn from less to more too!

The common perception is that Google penalizes new websites by artificially putting down their rankings and keeping new websites out of the top results for an undetermined period of time (between 6 to 18 months).

There is a lot of argument on what the Sandbox is but two things must be absolutely clear for us to begin with:

• This effect concerns new sites only
• Evidence shows that new websites in fact do not get ranked as well as they “should”.

New sites are thus penalized by Google (placed in the Sandbox, so to speak) and can only break out once Google ‘lets’ them – usually when this ‘penalty’ expires.

This is the basic view on Google Sandbox. Like most things in SEO, it is also depressingly simplistic and fails to take into account what Google’s algorithm works like.

So if you were to ask me if Google Sandbox existed, I’d say yes and no. Yes, because the effects it describes are real and documented. No, because the reasoning and causation provided is inaccurate.

Ok, really now, what the hell is the Sandbox?

(The following is speculation – and while this is no different than the reasoning provided for the Sandbox effect, it is in my view more accurate and keeping with the facts, especially with evidence of websites that do not get sandboxed at all).

The Sandbox is hard to understand primarily because we don’t have an accurate understanding of how Google’s ranking algorithm works.

Google filters new links that it finds based on the following filters:

• Time since the page was first found

  This is a penalty that decreases with time (as the page gets older).

• Age of the website in Google’s index

  When was the website first indexed by Google? A website’s age is just one of several measures Google takes to determine the “authority” status of a website. This has been shown to matter indirectly by several SEOs who bought out old websites in their industries instead of setting up new websites (read Screw the Sandbox – Buy old sites – especially the comments section – for more on this).

• Age of the domain

  How old is the domain? The effects of the domain-age factor are once again debatable, but as mentioned above, evidence suggests that if you want to skip the sandbox, one strategy is to buy old websites and use them.

• Quality of backlinks

  Backlink “quality” is a whole different can of worms and is covered in serious detail elsewhere. For the purposes of this discussion, if a new page has links from other web pages / websites that are already highly ranked (sites considered as “authorities” in their niches), then those links are considered quality links and that page has a good chance of ranking highly (and possibly skipping the sandbox altogether).

• Link-building patterns

  Did all the links to this site suddenly pop up one fine day? If so, is there an overwhelming diversity in the nature of the links (something that would happen if the website got ‘dugg’ or covered by a major newspaper or other website, for example)?

  If not, there is a chance those links were bought or gained through reciprocal linking.

  Many SEOs prescribe following ‘natural’ link-building patterns – the problem is that in Google’s ideal world you don’t solicit or buy links – you network and produce ‘linkable’ content, and the rest takes care of itself.

  For Google then, if you wish to follow natural link building, go viral, create link bait and focus on creating quality linkable content.

  Or if you can afford to wait for an year, screw the “natural” bit and get as many links as possible (don’t forget to super-optimize your website) – Yahoo and MSN will treat you like royalty, and 30-40% of the web’s traffic isn’t bad, is it?

There are most definitely other factors that come into consideration as well, such as the age of the domain, or the update frequency of the sites linking to this new page.

However, the bottom line is that Sandbox does not exist in the form that people have described it to be. At best, it is a side-effect of the various measures Google takes to provide the most relevant results to its users.

The rest of this article describes how you can beat the sandbox effect – whether you are starting a new site or if you’re stuck in the sandbox with no hope in sight.

How To Beat The Sandbox Effect

Ok, let’s pretend for a second that you are launching a brand new website and you want to skip the sandbox effect. This means, that in effect, you have to prove to Google that your website is one of the, if not THE, authority websites in your niche. You would do that by getting a wide variety of websites to link to you (within their content if possible).

Lots of links, varied anchor text, if possible within content. Sounds like link bait to me. Get on to it.

It is also possible to rank highly through smart reciprocal linking (in-content), but you still have to back that up with one-way links.

Help! I’m stuck in the Sandbox!

A common pattern for new websites is that they tend to rank immediately for their key terms (especially if this website has done extensive link-building early on), but then fall off the charts a few weeks or a couple of months later. This is the most obvious indication that a site has fallen victim to the Sandbox effect, and the severity of this drop from the SERPS is what leads most people to argue so strongly in favor of a Google Sandbox.

If you find out that your website doesn’t rank well at all (at times not even for your own name) and that the top websites for your keywords are all trash, AND you rank well for your keywords in Yahoo and MSN, you’re literally stuck in the Sandbox.

Google now thinks that your website cannot be immediately trusted (based on the information it has gathered from your website and its backlinks). Even more to the point (since Google is heavily biased in favor of link-based analysis), Google does not trust your backlinks.

Thoughts on ageing

No, this is not a tangent on getting old. I’m talking about links. Once important concept to remember is that Google can track the ‘age’ of a link – that is, how long ago was this link discovered by Google. SEOs have theorized that Google uses link-ageing to establish the ‘trust’ for a link

Thoughts on trusted links

A link is trusted by Google based on the following criteria:

• How popular / trusted the linking website is – authority sites do best.
• Age of the link – as discussed above.
• Nature of link (in-content vs. link list, main page vs. sub-page) – In-content links work best, and the location of the link itself matters as well (better to be on the main page than in some long-lost corner).
• Direction of link - Link to the main page vs. a link to an inner page.
• Links to inner pages (deep links) are definitely more valuable as they are a validation that your website’s content is good enough to be linked to (and thus ‘more relevant’).

How To Get Out Of The Sandbox

Quite simply, build links that Google can trust. Create linkable content (reports, new tools, articles) and promote them on your site, in forums and around social bookmarking sites (if appropriate). The key is to realize that if your site is suffering from the sandbox effect, it is because of something you did (or didn’t do).

Similarly, it’s in your hands to get out of the sandbox. All you have to do (excuse the pun) is to stop relying on old-fashioned link-building and start thinking “outside the box”.